Steve 'Flash' JuonEDITOR’S NOTE: Hip Hop Rising by Martin Pearson and Deverill Weekes is available on Etsy now. This is not an affiliate link and only benefits the authors if you use it. A promotional copy of the book was provided for the purpose of this review.
Publishing a book these days requires an incredible amount of self-confidence. Trying to even find a book store to buy one in can be an exercise in extreme frustration. Big players like Borders closed up shop over a decade ago in the U.S., while former rival Barnes & Noble now owns their trademark and somehow clings to 600 retail locations. In fact the chances are if you’re reading this you’re more likely to find a mom & pop bookstore in your neighborhood than a “brick and mortar” store, and they need your support more anyway — they don’t have corporate investors to bail them out. If I saw a copy of Hip Hop Rising in one I’d certainly want to spend my money there, but as of right now it seems to be available exclusive through Etsy.
The point here is that Martin Pearson and Deverill Weekes have chutzpah. In a landscape where putting ink to paper has become as rare as the stores that sell it to you, any book whether hardbound or soft cover feels like an act of defiance. That’s certainly in keeping with the artists profiled within its pages. As the intro explains the careers of both men — Pearson as a writer and Weeks as a photographer — came of age at the same time rap music became a cultural juggernaut worldwide. You can see the rapid transition over the last 30+ years in the book’s first two photographs. We see a young Calvin Broadus just beginning his ascent to rap stardom, then we see an elder Snoop Dogg standing shoulder to shoulder with Martha Stewart. Our two authors were UK transplants to California with both the fortune and the passion to chronicle how rap spread hip-hop culture around the world at a time when it was both topping the charts and rapidly changing from its birth in the 1970’s and golden age in the 80’s.
The book is a compilation of the work they did back then, with “where are they now” style introductions added to let you know where they are today, along with some admitted light editing for clarity. The only downside of that as a writer myself I found myself questioning things that weren’t edited. An overzealous editor Pearson worked for back then might have seen the young man write Organized Konfusion with a “K” and think “Well that young bloke of ours cocked it up didn’t he?” He’d replace the “K” with a “C” and think nothing of it. Pearson could have reverted that edit in his write up about the The Whooliganz and didn’t.
Skimming through his old work looking for bigger fish to fry, I can see how Pearson let a word that was (technically) spelled correctly slide. The bigger problem is with pieces like the one on P.M. Dawn. While Pearson updated his Gang Starr piece to reflect Guru’s death and his Beastie Boys piece to mention the passing of Adam “MCA” Yauch, he declined to do so for Attrell Cordes even though Prince Be passed in 2016. He updates the Whodini article without mentioning the passing of John “Ecstasy” Fletcher as well. I only bring this up because it wouldn’t be nearly so noticeable if it wasn’t inconsistent. Don’t just do it for some artists and not others — show respect to all of those who have passed on.
On the whole this is an excellent book, and some sections really stand out. The very first interview is with Ice T and even back then a multiple page write up with multiple photographs was warranted and well deserved. I’d love to see Pearson do a follow up interview with Tracy Marrow now. At the time he was just starting to get his feet wet in acting, now people are more likely to know him for that than rapping. I appreciate the love shown to proto-rap acts like The Watts Prophets (although once again the passing of two members was not mentioned) and 80’s stars like Doug E. Fresh and Daddy-O, along with more obscure domestic rap acts like Mad Kap and European artists like Marxman who are lesser known here. Pearson no doubt had a large wealth of material to choose from for this compilation and I believe he made the choicest cuts.
There are two other things about this book though that I feel I should point out. First and arguably less important is that there aren’t page numbers throughout, which necessarily means there is also no index at the end of the book nor table of contents at the beginning. Selfishly I’ve come to expect those features from anything that’s either a compendium or historical in nature so I can quickly reference my favorite parts, just as you might expect a Wikipedia entry to have a menu that lets you skip to different parts of an artist’s career. The lack of it makes you crave it all the more. Keep a stack of bookmarks at the ready to shove in for the parts you like, or dog ear the pages if you must (I’d rather you not).
Secondly it appears to me the original negatives for Weekes’ photography were lost to time. As such the photos from the original print articles were scanned in then enlarged to fit the layout. If I’m wrong Pearson can send me a note to say so, but blurry photos for Masta Ace and the Beastie Boys suggest I’m not. If you’re reading for just the print and don’t care about it that’s cool, but it only becomes more noticeable when you see either a Creative Commons photo or a stock photo provided by the artist or their record label. Those are invariably sharp as a tack. Not all of Weekes’ pictures lose something in translation to this oversized book, but if a second printing with revisions is made then I’d also look hard for those negatives so that his lens work is as sharp as Pearson’s pen work.
By no means should your conclusion at the end of this review be that Hip Hop Rising is a product I don’t recommend. In fact I can only be critical of the things that I noticed because I enjoyed it so much. It’s already a good book and with a second printing to fix a few things and enhance a few others it could be that much better. I’m encouraged by the fact there is still a market for books about hip-hop in this day and age, and for that reason if no other I highly encourage you to seek out a copy. If you’re more the Kindle type of reader there may be a digital version later, but if you don’t want to wait and you already have a bookshelf in your home or apartment, make a little more room for this large book. It commands a higher price because of that size, but like a good record, you’ll enjoy it more than once.